Voodoo Dolls and Magic Wands

I've joined some Pagan themed groups on Swap-bot. I'm not Pagan myself but I admire the religion for many reasons. It's got some great symbols, stories, and paranormal-esque (magic, spells, etc) beliefs. All of those things make for some neat swaps.

Last month I created an "authentic" magic wand. And tonight (or this morning really..it's 7 AM) I finished my voodoo doll. The wand is complete with a single terminated quartz Arkansas crystal, which all wands must have (apparently..I don't know much about wands). The voodoo doll was themed around "junk" or scraps of things we had. All parts of it had to be made from scraps, which was easy for me since I have a ton. It was themed "Banish the Junk Voodoo Doll". I almost want to keep it and Lily really wants it, but I've mad tons of voodoo dolls so I'll just make another.

I'm pretty proud of both. Here they are for your viewing pleasure:

 I actually went outside and found a nice stick. I sanded it, added shimmer pigment to purple paint, and let it dry.


I affixed the crystal to the end with super glue and wrapped wire around it. You can see but I braided this silver/pink Martha Stewart ribbon and wrapped it around the base of the wire wrapped crystal. Then I added a silver gemstone.

 The handle is made with this metallic silver Premo polymer clay. More braided ribbon and gemstones, plus a glass butterfly pendant.

The Latest.

I just got back from one of the best trips I've ever been on with some people who make me feel pretty sparkley and sunshiney, just like the places we visited. We drove from St.Louis to Cape Canaveral, Florida (18 hours) and boarded the Norwegian Sun, which took us to Cozumel and Key West. Cozumel was amazing, as were the ancient Mayan ruins we visited. Key West was fun and colorful. The ocean was beautiful, the (totally free) food was great, and so was the beading, which was what this entire trip was really about.

Cozumel, Mexico

A good friend of mine, Abbi, works as an instructor at her mom and aunt's bead store, The Bead Place. She was invited on this cruise to instruct a group of women in the art of jewelry making. I tagged along and learned some fun stuff. The first was "Viking Knit" which is like knitting with wire to make a Pandora style bracelet. The next was "Russian Spiral" which is a really simple technique that creates a not so simple, but super cute bracelet. I loved both of them and can't decide which one I love more. I'll definitely be making more. Abbi also taught a few ladies how to make starfish with beads, but I was immersed in my second Russian Spiral bracelet and didn't get the chance to learn.

Here are my new bracelets:

Soft Greens Russian Spiral bracelet

Soft Pinks Russian Spiral bracelet

Viking Knit front with Pandora style beads

Viking Knit back

Painting

"While we try to teach our 
children all about life,
Our children teach us what life is all about."

Livejournal.

I have successfully and steadily been maintaining a livejournal since early 2004. For the past half hour I was reminiscing my life as a 14 year old. Life was so incredibly simple at 14 even though I had an asian boyfriend and too many friends. It was the life. I'd like to share with my friends, family, and the internet one particular entry I wrote in honor of my friend Ed, who I left out of a previous entry about a trip to the mall on accident. On October 24, 2004 I wrote:

this journal entry goes out to Ed, because I forgot to mention in the previous entry that he was at the mall with us. I feel bad, I'm sorry Ed. But this entrys all for my pal Ed.
What I like about Ed.

• He is really nice despite the intimating stares
• He wears pants with metal on them, but its not really metal. Its like metal.
• He rarely wears any other pants
• He's tall
• He's nice to hug if you can catch him
• He looked very nice in that green shirt he wore last night at the mall
• He is very good at arcade games
• He is genourous
• Hes throws my trash away for me if I ask
• He never ment to fling red jello at my butt
• Hes funny
• deep down hes quite sentimental
• He has a knife
• He has a neat lighter
• Hes like a teddy bear
• His name has only 2 letters in it
• Hes mysterious

Eds a nice guy. Standing ovations for Ed.
x sarah

End entry.
-----

My favorite line: He wears pants with metal on them, but its not really metal. Its like metal.

I also enjoyed my misspelling of intimidating as "intimating".

Ed's pants:

The Truth Pt. 2

I'm a lonely woman (having my lover away so often) so I Google a lot of sexy men... Well that's not really why. I do it becauseI <3 boys. I always have. But anyway, consider this a part TWO to my previous post "The Truth" featuring Rob Pattinson. Here is another man who hold's like... 1/16th of my heart (there are many men who hold the other 16 parts).

Who is he? Charlie Day! He plays my favorite character, Charlie Kelly, on my second favorite show "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia". I love him because he's quirky and looks like a real person UNLIKE Robert. Robert looks too much like he tries to look dirty...like he is so dirty he is clean...because he has a live-in stylist. Charlie Day probably doesn't make enough money for a stylist yet. Another reason I like him is because he is married in RL to his love-obsession "the waitress" on "It's Always Sunny..."

Hey-oh!

I'm not sure if I'm in over my head but I'm hosting a lot of swaps at the moment, swaps YOU should sign up for. They are all fairly easy.

I'm hosting 7 swaps on the Seven Deadly Sins. I had an assignment in my photo class I really enjoyed and I think some neat ATC's would come out of this. Each swap is two weeks long, 1 ATC for 1 partner. Pretty easy and they are spaced out through the entire summer.
1. Pride atc swap (sign up deadline is May 26th!!!!!)
2. Envy atc swap
3. Gluttony atc swap
4. Lust atc swap
5. Anger atc swap
6. Greed atc swap
7. Sloth atc swap

I'm hosting a Cryptozoology ATC swap, which is going to be neat! 1 ATC for 1 partner. Basically, design an ATC based off of your favorite cryptid! Mine is the Mothman. I love him!

My last swap is not ATC related but very similar to the swap I blogged about here. I am using loreley's idea for the group I'm an officer in called Random Bits of Lovely. If anyone wants to join this swap you'll need to request to join the group. Anyway, the swap is called the Lovely Jewelry Box swap.

We'll be decorating one of those small wooden, unpainted craft jewelry boxes in a way that our partner would like. See the swap home-page for more details.


So, I'm hosting 9 pretty evenly spaced out swaps. That doesn't sound so bad...on top of the other 15 swaps I'm in. I should probably slow the swapping down a bit since I'm going to school full-time this summer and working on buying a house.

-Saristotle